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Medical malpractice lawsuits carry a remarkably high burden of proof with them. If you’re the plaintiff in a malpractice case, it is your responsibility to prove that your doctor was reckless and negligent with your care.
As you partner with an attorney to prepare your case, learn some of the most common reasons why medical malpractice suits get dismissed. Know the challenges you’re facing so you and your lawyer can strengthen your suit.
Inadequate Expert Testimony
In many medical malpractice suits, the plaintiff enlists a third party in the medical field to examine the patient in question and provide testimony about what went wrong with their care. However, if the expert witness isn’t actually an expert at all, or if they cannot prove that the defendant provided poor care, the case may be dismissed outright.
Plaintiff Cannot Prove Poor Standard of Care
Doctors and other medical professionals must abide by a certain standard of care in order to retain their licenses to practice. To prove malpractice, you must definitively show that your doctor failed to meet that standard.
It isn’t enough to prove that you became ill, or that another doctor may have made different choices. To win a medical malpractice case, you and your physician negligence attorney must prove that your doctor failed to act reasonably or with adequate care based on the circumstances.
Plaintiff Cannot Tie Cause to Effect
Another essential element of a strong malpractice case is the direct connection between your doctor’s actions—or inactions—and the negative outcome you experienced. Correlation does not always equal causation; you were already sick when you sought treatment, so you must prove that your treatment actively made you sicker.
Proving a cause-and-effect relationship in court generally requires testimony from medical experts not directly involved in the case. You, your expert witnesses, and your attorney will have to rule out your underlying condition as the ultimate cause of your illness.
Prevent your malpractice case from being dismissed by learning from other plaintiffs’ mistakes; these are some of the most common reasons why medical malpractice suits get thrown out. Work with an attorney from Rossman Law Group to strengthen your own case.
